ITC, a U.S. trade panel, on Monday ruled that Apple did not violate a Google-owned Motorola patent to make the iPhones.=

Responding to the ruling Google said that it was evaluating its options, which include an appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Google had accused Apple in 2010 of infringing on six patents for iPhone-related technology. Two were terminated from the case, and the ITC said last August that Apple was innocent of infringing three others. The commission had asked judge Thomas Pender to reconsider its finding that Apple did not violate a fourth patent, which is for a sensor to monitor the location of a user's head to keep it from maneuvering on the touch screen. Pender found that patent obvious in December, and the full ITC came to the same conclusion on Monday.

If Apple had been found guilty of violating the patent, its devices could have been banned from being imported into the United States.